Aptiv Inc. announced it has invested $45 million in its Orgadam plant as part of its expansion plans to produce fully integrated cockpit controllers for four-wheelers.

“We have more or less completed the investment and the first product will be out in six months. Initially, it will be for passenger cars and later for commercial vehicles,” Vice President and Managing Director, AS&UX APAC (Non-China), Arun Devaraj told The Hindu.

“We continue to expand our business in India and are excited to build the next generation of software-defined, fully-integrated cockpit controllers for our customers,” said Senior Vice President and President of Advanced Safety and User Experience (AS&UX) Matthew Cole.

According to him, the fresh investment is made towards engineering and facilities, expanding production capacity to provide automotive manufacturers with software-defined cockpit solutions. Aptiv also plans to double the number of headcount.

The expanded facility spread over 220,000 square feet will produce cutting-edge cockpit control systems and will scale up to include advanced safety and user experience features such as radars, cameras and next-generation electronic control units for India and global markets.

“It is the first Made in India product for the Indian market. First, we will address the needs of domestic market and later we will think about exporting it,” Mr. Devaraj said.

Aptiv serves transportation, aerospace & defence, telecommunications and industrial markets. In India, it has seven manufacturing facilities, three technical centres and one global tooling centre.